Faction Before Family
by InsideTheFangirlsHead
Summary: Her words are soft, soothing. Like my moms when she would tell me that nightmares weren't real. "Are you on my side, Caleb?" She asks, "Do you trust me?" Caleb gets summoned to Jeanine's office because she's in need of his...abilities.


**Hello. So, this is my first story for this fandom. I hope you enjoy it.**

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The keys are smooth, cold under my fingers. Im pretending to work away at the high-tech computers. Rolling my neck I look around. I am in one of the many technology labs in the Erudite head quarters. The far wall is glass, panels of it that divide the skyline up into a kind of grid. You get this effect in nearly every single room. In each room you're able to look out on the city and have it divided into equal parts, each containing their own important piece of information.

The two longest walls of this rectangular room are painted a shade of blue so light that, had you not spent as much time as I had staring at the walls; you would've thought they _were _white. The wall opposite the glass wall is a cold grey, like steel. So somebody looking in from the outside in would get the impression of a cold, lifeless room.

Normally, this environment is incredibly relaxing, the pallor and monotonity of the room making it easier to focus, easier to be absorbed in work, in learning.

Everybody else, male, female, initiate or not are staring zombie-like at their screens. Many of them wear glasses so you can see the faint reflection of the screens on the lenses. If the others were to look up could they see the reflection of my inactive screen in my lenses? Could they see that, even though my fingers are tapping rapidly on the keyboard, nothing of consequence is being produced from my time and effort. I can't concentrate. I keep looking around the room, as if somewhere in this cool, functional room I'll see something that could calm me down.

Blue is a calming colour.

Black is not. It is mysterious, it represents power and death.

Beatrice looks very different in black. She looks very different with makeup. She looks very different from my sister. My sister would not have barged into the Erudite headquarters when she knew very well she was not supposed to be there. She would not have had to be forced to leave, she would not have left with an air of defiance.

She had changed so fast.

Then there's another part of me saying _No, she didn't change at all, did you change when you left Abnegation? Did you become a new person? Or did you just become more of yourself than you were ever allowed to be? _Had I really grown up with that girl,had she been covering up for all these years as I had? admittedly she had not done as good a job as I had. She must be Dauntless through and through, which is why she could never hide her distaste for Abnegation. It was the polar opposite of her faction. I knew she would transfer. I knew she would break our parents heart, I highly doubt she had suspected the same of me. Maybe thats one of the perks of being Divergent. Maybe being divergent is easier to hide than the Amity in my aptitude test had said.

He had red hair, a couple shades lighter than his long sleeved shirt. He had jeans on, not the washed out and frayed kind that I usually associated with the Amity, he had a nice clean pair on.

I felt very dark and dangerous in all my gray. Dark, because I felt all the light in the room was coming from the man, Harold, and being sucked in by me. Dangerous, because of the way he was looking at me. There was apprehension, concern - selfish and selfless, I could see him debating about whether he should just lie to me, get me to leave and hopefully never see me again. Or tell me the whole truth and expose me to the danger of my situation.

I knew my situation was not ideal. I knew that my test had not yielded a conclusive result.

"I know you know what I'm about to say." he tells me, there are empathetic undertones to his voice, he realizes that I'm dangerous. But he also realizes I do not want to be such a threat.

"Inconclusive?" I ask, even though I already know.

"Divergent," He nods. "You know what that means." He states.

"I am not compatible to any one faction. I could go in more than one. And I'm dangerous because of it."

It surprises me, that he doesn't question where I got the information. However, I don't have much information on the subject. Only a phrase or two in all my coveted books. Nothing explicitly said anything about, divergents. But it was implied. reading between the lines you could find that there were people, _dangerous_ people who con't be controlled because their minds were so diverse.

He nods, " You have an equal aptitude for Erudite, Amity and Dauntless." I feel my eyebrows raise in confusion. How can somebody be Amity and Dauntless, peaceful, but violent? I suspect that the Amity in the room with me was a transfer from Candor, he can read my face, he can tell I'm confused.

"Perhaps," he suggests. "You may be wired to believe that the only way to get peace, is to fight for it." My eyes flit from one corner of the room to the other, trying to find something to focus on. The only other thing in the room is the chair and the equipment used for the aptitude test. Which only brings my mind back around to my present situation.

"There's no way I could do that." I gulp.

" Do what?" Harold's eyebrows shoot up.

"Fight." I explain shortly. His answer is so serious and true, I would've assumed he'd spent a long time coming up with it if his way of saying it wasn't so natural.

"Not all fights are physical. After all, you do show aptitude for Erudite Mr. Prior."

I shake my head, that event has replayed many times since then. Each time unhinging me more and more. I feel eyes on the back on the side of my head. There's somebody in the door. Somebody either A) important or B) scary by the way everybody stops working at their computers and the room goes silent.

I turn, just my luck; its two somebody's. Both important and scary. They're security guards, who work for Jeanine. And they're looking right at me.

"Caleb Prior."

_Crap..._

I get up quickly, I don't even turn off my computer. It'll turn off by itself very soon anyway. One of the innovations used to conserve energy in the Erudite headquarters. Other eyes follow me as I walk to the door. The room is still silent. I get to the secruity guards, dressed in a very, very dark shade of blue. Its almost black. Perhaps it is black, but just looks blue because of the walls. The don't acknowledge me when I walk up to them. The just turn and start down the hallway. As soon as I'm out of view from the door way i hear they keyboards start to click again as people get back to work. Double spped now because they lost a precious 30 seconds of working time as they all stared at me leaving the room.

I walk two paces behind the guards. They're taking me to Jeanine. They haven't said it yet. But I'm Erudite enough to know. However, you do not need to be an Erudite to know, that if you're being brought to Jeanine's office by guards, you're in a spot of trouble.

I'm not sure what I had expected from Jeanine Matthews office. Extensively labeled diagrams of the brain? Shelves of meticulously filed research papers? A large screen of digital statistics of laboratory and computer use?

I didn't get any of that. Her room reflected her. It was cold, impersonal, hard to get a read on. And you knew, if you were in the room, you were being surveyed, monitored for research. The guards have left. Its only Jeanine and myself,

Jeanine herself sits behind her desk. Hair pulled back into a severe ponytail. The clothes I could see above the desk we a dark blue and perfectly ironed. Her nails, which were filed into perfect ovals tapped against her desk, rhythmically, counting out the beats until I was where she wanted me to be.

"Caleb," she said cooly, "Sit," her voice flowed smoothly as she gestured to the chair in front of the desk.

I sat.

"Miss. Mathews," I acknowledged. She smiled coyly at me.

"There is no need for any formalities here, Caleb. You're my friend, and I yours. First names are perfectly acceptable." She gave a little laugh at the end, but the smile did reach her eyes. They stayed cold, calculating. I ran my hands over the fabric of my pants, trying to wick the sweat from them. She may have said that we're friends, but I wasn't feeling it. I gulp, and her eyes snap to my face. She's assessing me. I stare back for a moment, but she locks her eyes to mine. I don't want to look away, I feel it would be rude. But for every second she looks at me, I feel she is unraveling more and more of my secrets. Then she moves, turning to face me right on.

"I need your help." Her voice has lost the sickly sweet edge it had before, it's now more serious, deeper.

_Why me?_ I think, I feel my eyebrows go up, and my forehead wrinkles in confusion. _What do I have that others higher than me in status do not have?_

"I'm sure you're aware of this already,and it's this reason that I'm in need of your help." I stay silent, I know what she means. But I can't be one hundred percent certain she knows. She might be attempting to get me to out myself. Its at least a half a minutes of terse silence before something happens. the corner of Jeanine's mouth twitches in agitation then she gets up out of her chair, its a sudden movement. Like a tornado suddenly materializing in the calm of a desert. She whips a pile of papers from her desk, twisting around to stand behind me. She holds one hand on my shoulder, the other out in front, holding out the papers. She's still again, the action potential reached, she calculated each of her movements to get to this point. No energy wasted.

I look at the papers in front of me. I know what they are: My results form my aptitude test. The ones I had assumed were erased.

Jeanine's hand tightens on my shoulder, its like having a hawk on you shoulder.

"You're Divergent." She whispers to me.

"I'm Divergent." I concede.

"You knew this." She is still perched on my shoulder.

"Yes."

"For which factions?" She pulls another page up. This one has my factions listed.

"Erudite." I read, "Amity. And Dauntless."

She removes herself from my shoulder.

She moves with her prudent movements back to her desk. She opens a drawer and pulls a manila file out of it. The file looks new, recent information.

"Thank you for telling me." She says, handing me the file. I feel as though whatever is contained here is my reward for confirming what she already knew.

I open the file.

There's a name printed at the top in thick black font.

Beatrice Prior.

My eyes dart up to Jeanine's, she's watching me and smiles. Beside her name is a security number. Then below, a photo. After that, her faction is listed. Beside the black _Dauntless _ is the word _unstable. _

"Beatrice is Divergent. Abnegation, Erudite, Dauntless. " I say. Jeanine doesn't respond. I read further. Our family is listed after that, faction before family. Even on paper.

There's a report on her initiation after this. Its not written by Jeanine. Its written by somebody else who doesn't care about the details or side affects. Its written by someone who needed to write it down and write it down quickly.

Below, is an... analysis. Written by Jeanine.

_Subject shows an aptitude for stubborness and violent reactions when provoked. Extreme mental control and loyalty. Has befriended many transfer initiates, many Candors. This alliance, could prove to be detrimental. Has the capability to become very influential in the dauntless faction. This possibility is not desirable. _

This is short, but I get the idea. My sister is Divergent. A divergent who has become much more dangerous than myself.

_That _surprised me. Dangerous. Beatrice. It doesn't fit. This is my little sister who would cry when she scraped her knee. The Beatrice I knew wouldn't hurt anybody. But this couldn't be a lie. My sister had become... _a threat. _

"What do you want me for." I ask closing the file.

"I need you to tell me something first." She says, leaning over the table. "Will you stay on this side?"

I stay silent. Its a big question to answer, when you don't know what one side represents. What does she have planned? What will I have to do? What will happen if I say no?

I know what will happen. I'll be factionless. Or killed. I could be factionless ; only able to watch as Jeanine either destroys the world, or makes it better.

"I promise no harm will come to you if you agree. Not if you agree and do your job well."

I look around the room. I notice now, a filing cabinet in the corner. She sees my gaze shift and smiles.

"This has been planned. We won't fail." I must be looking at the plans for whatever is going on.

"Will I have to fight?"

"I have people to point guns for me." She says, she's feeding me more information.

"What will I do?"

"You're sister will be opposed to this." she says. "You read the file, she's stubborn, prone to violence. She won't like this." her words are weaving in with my memory of her earlier today. The dark, mysterious person who talked to me. Stubborn, violent. those words match up with that girl. _Tris._ They don't match up with Beatrice.

_But she's not Beatrice anymore. _ I remind myself. She changed. She's grown into this role. She's grown into this rebel. Anything planned she doesn't agree with she will fight.

"Get her on our side, Caleb." Jeanine's stood up again. She's knelt down by the arm of my chair. "Get her to realize why we're fighting for this. You're her brother. I'll let you go to her faction. You can blend in. Your Divergence will help. But don't let anyone know you're Divergent. That way they think you're with them. Then tell her, when the time is right. Idea's sound so much better coming from the mouth of someone you... trust. She will trust you." Her words are soft, soothing. Like my moms when she would tell me that nightmares weren't real.

"Are you on my side, Caleb?" She asks, "Do you trust me?" We wait in silence for seconds, I see her nostrils flare when I don't answer right away.

"Yes."

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**what do you guys think? And just so you all know: I WILL NOT BE CONTINUING THIS.**

**Review with thought on this?**


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